About this document:
If you are a student or faculty member who would like to use the power of a vast networked computer system to enhance your educational experience of MIT, Athena is for you.
This document introduces you to the Athena system, and lets you know where to turn to for more information:
Athena users have access to software to help them write papers, create graphs, analyze data, communicate with their colleagues, play games, and perform countless other tasks, as well as software designed specifically for classwork.
Athena has pervaded campus life. At last count, 97% of MIT undergraduates and 81% of MIT graduate students had Athena accounts. On a typical day, over 6,000 different users access their personal files and various software packages on the system. You too can use the vast resources of Athena for your educational computing needs.
This section is intended to help orient you to the Athena system, by summarizing the history and basic design of the Athena system, and providing a brief survey of the software applications available to you as an Athena user.
Project Athena's mandate was to explore diverse uses of computing and to build the base of knowledge needed for a longer term strategic decision about how computers fit into the MIT curriculum. In January of 1988, Project Athena was granted a three-year extension to the original five-year program, and on June 30, 1991, Project Athena came to an end. But the fruit of Project Athena -- the Athena system itself -- was adopted as MIT's academic computing infrastructure, with plans to extend it beyond the educational sphere, into the research and administrative activities of the Institute.
What, then, is Athena? It is a campus-wide networked computer system serving the needs of MIT's academic community. Rather than having a single computing center, Athena has over 600 publicly-accessible end-user workstations distributed around campus in both public and departmental "clusters" where students and faculty can go 24 hours a day, 365 days a year to do classwork, write papers, do personal work, and communicate with other computer users worldwide.
The Athena system is actually composed of a large number of machines (workstations, printers, and servers) that are networked together, and is far more powerful than other computing facilities you have probably used.
Athena provides a bridge between the two familiar extremes of stand-alone personal computers and timesharing machines. Each user of an Athena public workstation has a dedicated, powerful multitasking computer at his or her disposal. And each Athena workstation is connected to MITnet, the campus-wide computer network, so you can access a number of shared services that would normally be available only on a central facility.
You are able to move from one Athena workstation to another with no change in your work environment because Athena follows a distributed client/server model for delivering many of its computer services.
In a client/server model, specially designed software programs ("clients") on one computer can access (or be supplied with) services from one or more other special-purpose computers located elsewhere on the network ("servers"). A client/server model, in other words, employs an extensive division of labor: most computations are handled on the local machine (under the control of the locally-run client software), while the storage of files and other services are actually delivered from elsewhere on the network (by the server computers explicitly devoted to delivering those services).
Thus, unlike stand-alone computers or timesharing systems, you don't need to have everything (software and data) all on one machine to which you are directly connected. Rather, you just need clients available locally (and, of course, a network connection), and the clients will take care of working with the remote servers to provide you what you need. (The clients don't even have to run on Athena workstations. A number of clients have already been developed to help users of personal computers -- e.g., Macintosh and DOS/Windows machines -- gain access to some central services such as email and Zephyr.)
Athena uses the distributed client/server model extensively. Only a few essential pieces of system software are actually kept on the Athena public workstations -- everything else is delivered and maintained remotely. In fact, because there are so many Athena client programs (and the typical Athena public workstation's hard disk doesn't have enough storage space to hold all these programs anyway), most of the Athena client programs are themselves kept on special servers, and are only delivered to your local machine when you need to use them. In other words, even most of the clients on Athena workstations are delivered by servers! This greatly helps to reduce the burden on the local workstation, and the local machine is consequently freed up to apply almost all of its extensive computing power to the specific applications you are running at the moment.
For example, suppose you have logged into an Athena public workstation and you want to use the Emacs text editor to write a paper. When you issue the emacs command, your workstation contacts the appropriate server and copies the Emacs program from that machine into its own memory. The program then executes on your own workstation, using all of the workstation's computing power. Note that this happens without your having to worry about it -- you just type the command, and the workstation takes care of the rest.
Similarly, your private mail accumulates at a post office server (not on the public workstation you are logged into) until you pick it up; and once you pick up your mail ("incorporate" it), it is not placed on the local workstation then, either -- instead, it is placed with your other personal files on a file server elsewhere on the network. In fact, although files that you work on are copied to the local workstation for the time you work on them, none of your personal files are stored on a public workstation ever.
The client/server model allows centrally-managed services to be concentrated so that a relatively small staff can support the system. Client and server workstations are widely distributed geographically, and extensive security of software on public workstations is not needed. The following schematic gives only a hint of the complexity of the distributed Athena system (for more information, see the document Welcome to MITnet).
Much of the original equipment for Project Athena was donated by its chief sponsors, Digital Equipment Corporation and the IBM Corporation. But there has been ongoing work to extend the Athena computing environment to work on machine types developed by other vendors as well. Currently, most of the workstations are one of the following types:
In addition to the workstations, Athena provides other hardware facilities:
All of the software listed in the following pages -- and much more -- is available to any Athena user logged in at a workstation in a public cluster. Users accessing Athena indirectly (e.g., from a dorm room or living group, or from a campus office) may not have access to all of the software listed, or may have access to text-only versions rather than the full-screen versions available at a workstation. But full PC-based clients are starting to be made available for an increasing number of Athena applications.
System Software
The software making the distributed Athena environment possible includes
several key elements:
Tools for Internet Access
Athena provides software that lets you take full advantage of your connection
to MITnet, giving you access to the Internet and the World Wide Web through
programs such as:
The answer to this question has been a resounding "yes!", and it has not been limited to one particular model of teaching. Many different classes make use of Athena and assign homework that specifically requires students to use the system. Software used in course work includes both programs that were written here at the Institute specifically for a given subject, and commercial software licensed for use at MIT.
Two pieces of general-purpose course software developed on Athena deserve mention:
In addition to its expected effects in the classroom, Project Athena and its descendents have had substantial effects on the academic community at MIT, and on the ability and inclination of faculty and students to communicate easily and effectively across physical and disciplinary boundaries.
Tools for Programmers
For users who want not only to use available applications but also to create
their own (e.g., courseware developers), the Athena system provides some of the
most popular computing languages, including C, C++, FORTRAN, and Lisp.
Most newly-written large applications at Athena are done in the C language, because C is the "native" language of UNIX (hence applications written in C can make use of every feature and library of the system) and Athena provides an extensive set of debugging tools for C programmers -- for example, in addition to regular and optimizing C compilers, an interpreter named CodeCenter (Saber) provides a significant aid for program developers.
Several libraries of application subroutines are also part of the standard Athena system, including:
Athena also provides access to cT, an interactive programming language which enables users to easily create applications that have a graphical user interface, with easy portability to DOS and Macintosh platforms.
You don't have to know everything about the Athena system just to use it. If you don't understand some part of Athena, don't worry -- nobody knows everything about Athena. Everyone knows different parts of the system, and you'll find that people love to share what they know, so ask around.
If you are a student, Athena can help you with almost any aspect of your classwork. Do you need to write a paper, create a graph, or analyze some data? Athena has text-processors, graphics packages, and numerical software to help you. Are you trying to get your homework done? Many classes have created their own software on Athena that forms an essential part of their curricula. What's more, you can access many of the Athena services right from your dorm room.
If you are a faculty member, Athena can help you both as a teacher and a scholar. Computers can play a vital role in teaching fundamental concepts, as your colleagues in disciplines as varied as aeronautics, writing, and neurology have discovered. And electronic mail and other communication services can make your counterparts at other schools almost instantly accessible to you.
Even if you are not looking for tools to directly help you in your academic work, Athena may have what you are looking for. Writing your resume? Want to catch up on world news? How about relaxing with a game of chess or backgammon? Athena has software for you.
The Athena facilities are for you to use. We hope you will take full advantage of them.
Athena User Accounts office 11-124H phone x3-1325 email accounts@mit.edu
If you are an MIT staff member, you must first contact Athena User Acounts at x3-1325 before you will be able register. If you are a guest user, you and your Athena sponsor must fill out a "Guest Athena Accounts Request Form" before you will be able to register; these forms are available in the User Accounts office (11-124H) and the Athena Consultants' office (11-115).
The Athena hardware and the software licensed for that hardware are intended for educational use, broadly construed, by MIT community members. The account privileges extended to Athena users reflect this orientation. In exchange for these privileges, all users are expected to adhere to the Athena Rules of Use (included later in this document). For example, please note that Athena may not be used for sponsored research projects or personal gain.
Summary of Account Privileges
Among other things, an Athena account provides the user with the ability to log
into any public Athena workstation, and access to:
File Space Privileges
Each Athena user is provided with a limited amount of file storage space on
Athena, known as the user's "disk quota". Currently, the standard disk quota
allotment is 10,000 kilobytes (10 Meg). Users are expected to manage this space
for the lifetime of their account, using removable media (e.g., floppy
diskettes) for storage of material beyond their quota.
The standard quota of file storage space is sufficient for most users' needs. However, if you find that you need more space, especially if you are working on an Athena-sponsored project or an undergraduate thesis, you may request more space from Athena User Accounts. Athena will try to accommodate your request, but might not be able to grant as much space as you request, or might grant you the extra space only for a limited period of time.
In any space request (you may submit the request by email to accounts@mit.edu), be sure to include the following:
Regular Athena users are given a fresh print quota each September; new users get a fresh quota when their new account becomes active, and each September thereafter. Quota credit does not "roll over" into the following year -- each user starts afresh with the standard allotment.
If you exceed your print quota, the system sends a warning message on each subsequent print operation, but does not prevent you from printing. MIT, not Athena, bills users for pages printed beyond quota: students are billed through the Bursar's Office, faculty and staff through the Comptroller's Accounting Office.
If there are problems with your printed output, such as smudges, crooked printing, or extra marks on the page, Athena will refund to you, by crediting your print quota. Just submit the pages in question (and the header page, if you printed one), along with an "Athena Printing Refund Form" (available in the Athena User Accounts office or the Athena Consultants' office), to Athena User Accounts. An account consultant will take care of adjusting your account, and report the problem with the printer.
Athena's printing policy applies only to Athena's public printers. Departments, living groups, or other groups that own printers accessible from Athena may use different charging schemes. If you plan to send a file to a printer not in an Athena public cluster, you may want to check with that machine's system administrator first to be sure what accounting plan the printer is subject to.
Some departments or groups also maintain Athena printing account numbers. If you print a file and specify a valid account number, that account, rather than your own private print quota, will be charged for that print job. For more information about printing on Athena, see the document Printing from an Athena Workstation.
If you have special needs regarding print quotas, please contact Athena User Accounts.
The user file directory and contents associated with a deactivated account will remain on-line for at least 3 months to avoid mistaken deletion, but a user cannot gain access to these files except by special permission of Athena User Accounts. The existence of any data or files in the user directory beyond the 3-month period cannot be guaranteed by Athena.
If you need to make special arrangements to backup or transfer your data prior to deactivation, please contact Athena User Accounts.
Deactivation Criteria
Athena accounts will be deactivated according to the following guidelines, with
no other notification given:
Deactivation Due to Improper Use
If an Athena account is used in ways that violate the Rules of Use or other MIT
policies, or in ways that threaten system integrity or availability, that
account may be temporarily deactivated until Athena administrators are
satisfied that the improper use will not recur.
Reactivation of an Athena Account
To have an account reactivated, you need to meet eligibility guidelines (see
Eligibility for an Athena Account earlier) and present one of the
following to an Athena Accounts consultant:
Similarly, the Athena public facilities are provided as a community resource, and certain guidelines are necessary to help maintain this resource.
This section summarizes:
MITnet Rules of Use
Comply with Intended Use of the System
1. Don't violate the intended use of MITnet.
Assure Ethical Use of the System
2. Don't let anyone know your password(s).
3. Don't violate the privacy of other users.
4. Don't copy or misuse copyrighted software or related material.
5. Don't use MITnet to harass anyone in any way.
Assure Proper Use of System Resources
6. Don't overload the communication servers; in particular, don't abuse your electronic mail (email) or Zephyr privileges.
Additional Rules for Athena Public Facilities
Comply with Intended Use of the System
A1. Don't violate the intended use of the Athena system.
Protect Athena Equipment
A2. Don't eat, drink, or bring food or liquids into the Athena clusters.
A3. Don't turn the power off on Athena equipment.
A4. Don't reconfigure the cluster, either hardware or software.
Assure Fair Access to Public Workstations
A5. Don't violate the official priorities for the use of workstations; in particular, don't play games or engage in other non-academic activity if the cluster is busy, and don't log on to more than one workstation at a time.
A6. Don't leave your workstation unattended for more than 20 minutes.
A7. Don't make a lot of noise in the public clusters.
Assure Fair Access to Public Printers
A8. Don't violate the official priorities for the use of printers; in particular, don't be a printer hog or use the Athena printers as copy machines.
All network users are expected to follow these rules. Violations of the rules can subject the offender to Institute disciplinary proceedings and, in some cases, to state or federal prosecution.
Additional rules may be in effect for users of other computer facilities that have access to MITnet (check with your local system manager for details). Furthermore, several external networks to which MITnet provides access -- e.g., NEARnet, NSFnet, and CREN (including BITNET and CSNET) -- have their own rules of use to which MITnet users may be subject.
If you have questions or wish further information about any of these network policies, send e-mail to net-policy@mit.edu.
Complying with the Intended Use of the System
It is important that you understand the purpose of MITnet so that your use of
the system is in compliance with that purpose.
1. Don't violate the intended use of MITnet.
The purpose of MITnet is to support research, education, and MIT administrative activities, by providing access to computing resources and the opportunity for collaborative work. All use of the MIT network must be consistent with this purpose. For example:
Appropriate use of MITnet resources includes maintaining the security of the system, protecting privacy, and conforming to applicable laws, particularly copyright and harassment laws.
2. Don't let anyone know your password(s).
While you should feel free to let others know your username (this is the name by which you are known to the whole Internet user community), you should never ever let anyone know your account passwords. This includes even trusted friends, and computer system administrators (e.g., Information Systems staff).
Giving someone else your password is like giving them a signed blank check, or your charge card. You should never do this, even to "lend" your account to them temporarily. Anyone who has your password can use your account, and whatever they do that affects the system will be traced back to your username -- if your username or account is used in an abusive or otherwise inappropriate manner, you can be held responsible.
In fact, there is never any reason to tell anyone your password: every MIT student, faculty member, or on-campus staff person who wants an account of his or her own can have one (see Athena Account Policies). And if your goal is permitting other users to read or write some of your files, there are always ways of doing this without giving away your password.
For information about how to manage the security of your account, including advice on how to choose a good password, how to change passwords, and how to share information on Athena without giving away your password, see the document Managing Your Athena Account.
3. Don't violate the privacy of other users.
The Electronic Communications Privacy Act (18 USC 2510 et seq., as amended) and other federal laws protect the privacy of users of wire and electronic communications.
The facilities of MITnet, and the operating systems used by Athena and other MITnet systems, encourage sharing of information. Security mechanisms for protecting information from unintended access, from within the system or from the outside, are minimal. These mechanisms, by themselves, are not sufficient for a large community in which protection of individual privacy is as important as sharing (see, for example, sections 3.18/9 and 4.24 of MIT's Policies and Procedures). Users must therefore supplement the system's security mechanisms by using the system in a manner that preserves the privacy of themselves and others.
As Section 3.17 of MIT's Policies and Procedures notes, "invasions of privacy can take many forms, often inadvertent or well-intended." All users of MITnet should make sure that their actions don't violate the privacy of other users, if even unintentionally.
Some specific areas to watch for include the following:
4. Don't copy or misuse copyrighted software or related material.
Many programs, and related materials such as documentation, are owned by individual users or third parties, and are protected by copyright and other laws, together with licenses and other contractual agreements.
Such restrictions may include (but are not necessarily limited to) prohibitions against:
For more information about the legal issues surrounding duplication of software, see the pamphlet "Is it okay to copy my colleague's software?" To request a copy, send e-mail to sendpubs@mit.edu or call x3-5150.
(For guidelines on how to determine what licensing restrictions apply to specific software on Athena, see the document Summary of Available Athena Software. For other licensing questions, send email to swa@mit.edu, or call x3-3700.)
5. Don't use MITnet to harass anyone in any way.
"Harassment," according to MIT's Policies and Procedures (Section 3.16), is defined as:
any conduct, verbal or physical, on or off campus, which has the intent or effect of unreasonably interfering with an individual's or group's educational or work performance at MIT or which creates an intimidating, hostile or offensive educational, work or living environment.... Harassment on the basis of race, color, gender, disability, religion, national origin, sexual orientation or age includes harassment of an individual in terms of a stereotyped group characteristic, or because of that person's identification with a particular group.
The Institute's harassment policy extends to the networked world. For example, sending email or other electronic messages which unreasonably interfere with anyone's education or work at MIT may constitute harassment and is in violation of the intended use of the system.
Any member of the MIT community who feels harassed is encouraged to seek assistance and resolution of the complaint. To report incidents of on-line harassment, send email to stopit@mit.edu. (If you believe you are in danger, call the Campus Police immediately at x3-1212.)
Assuring Proper Use of the System
MITnet's resources, as well as the resources MITnet gives you access to (e.g.,
Athena, postal servers, bulletin boards, etc.), are powerful tools that can be
easily misused. Your use of the system should be consistent with the intended
uses of these resources. In particular, you should not overload the system or
otherwise abuse the network.
6. Don't overload the communication servers; in particular, don't abuse your electronic mail (email) or Zephyr privileges.
Electronic mail is a fast, convenient form of communication. It is easy to send electronic mail to multiple recipients, and you can even send a message to many recipients simply by specifying a single list name (i.e., by using a mailing list). However, this ability to send messages to many people makes it easy to misuse the system. The general rule is: use email to communicate with other specific users, not to broadcast announcements to the user community at large.
For example, while it is appropriate to use email to have an interactive discussion with a set of people (even 20 or more users) or to use email to send a single copy of an announcement to some "bulletin board" facility with a wide readership (e.g., Network News, or a Discuss meeting), it is not appropriate to use email as a way to broadcast information directly to a very large number of people (e.g., an entire MIT class). This is true whether you include the recipient usernames individually or by using a mailing list: under no circumstance should you use the email system to get a general announcement out to some large subset of the MIT community.
These guidelines are not based on etiquette alone: the mail system simply does not have the capacity to process a very large number of email messages at once. When a user sends out an announcement to a huge list of recipients, the mail servers get overloaded, disks fill up, and staff intervention is required. The overall result is a negative impact on the quality of service provided for all users.
These considerations apply to the Zephyr service as well. Zephyr is a central service involving thousands of transactions daily. Using Zephyr to transmit messages to a very large group of people degrades the system performance and is inappropriate.
Finally, the proliferation of electronic chain letters is especially abusive of the mail system and the network. Chain letters waste valuable computing resources, and may be considered harassing. Creating or forwarding chain letters may subject you to Institute disciplinary proceedings.
These rules apply to all users of Athena facilities, including students, faculty, and even IS/Athena staff. (In certain private Athena clusters, some of these rules may be relaxed, or additional rules may be in effect; check with your cluster's system manager).
If you need assistance in dealing with someone willfully violating the Athena rules, feel free to contact the Athena Hardware Hotline (phone: x3-1410, email: hotline@mit.edu), or send email to stopit@mit.edu. (If you believe you are in danger, call the Campus Police immediately at x3-1212.)
Complying with the Intended Use of the System
While MITnet is a general-purpose Institute resource in support of all kinds of
computing on campus, Athena is more specifically focused on academic computing
-- the use of computers in fulfilling the Institute's educational goals. This
special focus is echoed in a more specific intended use of the system.
A1. Don't violate the intended use of the Athena system.
Athena is an Institute resource for education. You should not take any actions that violate that purpose.
For instance, the following prohibitions, already implied in other rules (see MITnet Rules 1 and 4), are here expressed with a focus on Athena's role as an educational resource:
A2. Don't eat, drink, or bring food or liquids into the Athena clusters.
Food crumbs and spilled drinks are the primary cause of equipment damage in the Athena public clusters. This damage is produced not only in obvious ways (a spilled cup of coffee), but also in subtle ways (even the cumulative effect of sticky fingers or crumbs can ruin equipment -- keyboards have been damaged at the rate of one per day from food crumbs alone, and mice are equally vulnerable).
A3. Don't turn the power off on Athena equipment.
Turning the power off on Athena equipment (e.g., workstations, monitors, or printers) can permanently damage the hardware. However, if the equipment smells or looks like it is burning, do turn it off and contact the Athena Hardware Hotline.
A4. Don't reconfigure the cluster, either hardware or software.
Moving equipment will often cause damage, or may cause it to be reported as stolen. Permanent damage may result from even unplugging a keyboard.
Similarly, altering a workstation's filesystem in any way may render the machine unusable, or threaten its usability in other ways. For example, you should not reconfigure an Athena public workstation to allow remote connections unless you are actually sitting at that workstation. Even an apparently "harmless" change such as this (i.e., changing the access configuration of a workstation) may create major system security problems, and may actually jeopardize MIT's ability to license software for users in the future.
Also, do not remove Athena equipment -- or furniture! -- from any Athena public facility. Doing so constitutes theft and will be dealt with accordingly.
If you believe the configuration of a cluster needs to be changed, you can contact the Athena Hardware Hotline.
Assuring Fair Access to Public Workstations
Public clusters are facilities provided by Athena for members of the MIT
community to achieve their academic goals. As such, they are subject to
principles of use that support those goals -- the chief considerations being
fair access to the facilities for the widest possible set of users, and the
maintenance of a comfortable working environment. The rules below reflect these
considerations as they affect users of the public clusters.
These rules are easily summarized: please show consideration to other users.
A5. Don't violate the official priorities for the use of workstations; in particular, don't play games or engage in other non-academic activity if the cluster is busy, and don't log on to more than one workstation at a time.
In conformance with Athena's stated purpose, the priorities for use of the workstations in crowded public clusters are as follows:
Highest Priority: course-related work (including
theses)
Middle Priority: personal productivity work
(including non-course-related text
processing, sending mail, exploring
the Athena system)
Lowest Priority: recreational computing (including
game-playing)
Note that games are the lowest priority software on the system -- you should not play games if there are only a few workstations free, or if people are waiting for workstations. If a user needs a workstation for higher priority work while you are playing games, that user can ask you to give up your workstation. (Low priority activities may actually be disallowed entirely during certain times of the year to assure that the use of the clusters is consistent with the academic purpose of Athena. At these times, you are expected to refrain completely from low-priority activities as defined above.)
Similarly, some clusters have workstations which are reserved for specific course use, or which have special features. If you are using such a workstation for other than its special purpose, and someone who needs its unique feature asks you to surrender it, please do so gracefully.
A6. Don't leave your workstation unattended for more than 20 minutes.
If you are using a workstation in one of the public clusters and intend to keep using it but must leave it briefly unattended, you must limit your absence to 20 minutes or less and signal your situation to other users by taking one of the following actions:
If you are gone longer than twenty minutes or leave a workstation without a note or a valid countdown screensaver running, another user who needs a workstation is entitled to log you out or reboot the machine to make that machine available.
At certain times of the year, this rule may be adjusted downwards (e.g., the allowable "time away" may be reduced, possibly to 0) to assure that the clusters are being used effectively and that users will not be without a workstation while machines sit idle.
A7. Don't make a lot of noise in the public clusters.
Public clusters are similar to the MIT Libraries in that students who use these facilities have to be able to concentrate to do their work. Please don't play music, shout, or engage in loud conversation in the clusters.
Also, if you use a workstation that has sound capabilities, you are expected to use earphones rather than have the workstation audible to other users in the cluster.
Assuring Fair Access to Public Printers
Although most users are charged for printing if they go above a generous print
quota (see Athena Account Policies), restraint must still be exercised
when using Athena printers. This holds especially true when the clusters are
busy, to ensure fair access for everyone to this important service.
A8. Don't violate the official priorities for the use of printers; in particular, don't be a printer hog or use the Athena printers as copy machines.
Please don't print any large or complicated print job -- that is, any document or set of documents (such as text files, PostScript files, screen dumps, etc.) that takes longer than 10 minutes total to print -- on printers in the public clusters. Doing so ties up the printer for a long time, and other users won't be able to get printouts. If you have a long document, break it into sections to print out when the printer is not so busy, or check to see whether the program allows printing single pages from a long document if that's all you need. If you have many small documents, be sure to send them to the printer individually, or in several small groups, rather than all at once, and to send them when the printer is not so busy.
Similarly, the Athena printers should be used to print only one copy of a document. To make additional copies, please use copy machines. Printing multiple copies will often hold up other users from printing, and also wears out the printers. You can easily find copying services around campus that will allow you to duplicate pages for only a few cents per page.
=================================================================If you need help connecting your computer to the campus network (MITnet), contact your local network service representative: in a dorm, your Residential Computing Consultant (RCC); in an ILG, the network administrator; in other locations (e.g., MIT offices), the IS Network Help Desk at x3-4101.
If You Need Help Concerning... You Can Get Help From...
=================================================================
* Getting Started on Athena:
Accounts Athena User Accounts
* registering for an account office 11-124H
* changing your password phone x3-1325
* creating mailing lists/groups email accounts@mit.edu
* increasing your disk quota
* adjusting your print quota
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* Learning about Athena:
Training Athena Minicourse Training
* minicourse information phone x3-0184
* specific subjects' needs email training@mit.edu
* training on request
Documentation Athena Documentation
* available publications phone x3-5150
* where to find documents email sendpubs@mit.edu
* hardcopy resources online type "help" for * online resources On-Line Help (OLH)
-----------------------------------------------------------------
* Questions about Athena / Problems with Athena:
Athena Software and General Help Athena Consultants
* problems/bugs with Athena software office 11-115
* capabilities of Athena software phone x3-4435
* answers to commonly asked questions online type "olc" to
* finding out more about Athena connect to On-Line
* general questions about Athena Consultant (OLC)
Athena Hardware/Public Clusters Athena Hardware Hotline
* reporting equipment failures phone x3-1410
* reporting problems with printers email hotline@mit.edu
* reporting cluster network problems
* requesting equipment maintenance
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* Faculty Use of Athena:
Faculty/TA use of Athena ACS Faculty Liaisons
* using Athena for MIT courses office E40-357/359/360
* developing courseware on Athena phone x3-0115
email f_l@mit.edu
=================================================================
Athena User Accounts office 11-124H phone x3-1325 email accounts@mit.edu
The Accounts consultants are available for Athena users who:
You can find general information about taking care of your account in the free document Managing Your Athena Account, available with other Athena-produced documentation (see the section Athena Documentation for information about where to find Athena documents).
Athena Minicourse Training phone x3-0184 email training@mit.edu
There are separate minicourses on such topics as:
Intro to Athena Working on Athena Basic Word Processing Information Resources on Athena Math Software Overview
There are also individual minicourses focused on specific pieces of software (e.g., Emacs, EZ, LaTeX, Matlab, Maple).
Each minicourse takes about one hour and is designed to show you how to get the most value out of Athena's services and facilities. Each course consists of a short lecture and pertinent examples including interesting, useful, and even fun things about Athena. There is ample opportunity to ask questions, and free handouts of all material presented are distributed for your future reference.
Minicourses are taught in Room 3-343 at noon and in the evenings at various periods throughout the year. Each minicourse is repeated several times during the term.
Each term's schedule is published as a single-page, yellow Minicourse Index & Schedule that is distributed all over campus at the beginning of the term. (The schedule is available online in the Athena Minicourses submenu, which is under the Help on Athena submenu of the Dash Help menu.)
The classes are free and there is no preregistration.
The Athena Training group can also provide special minicourse sessions on a departmental basis, in large sections of courses using Athena, or for groups of 10 and more individuals who cannot make regular courses. Contact Athena Minicourse Training to set up a special class.
Athena Documentation phone x3-5150 email sendpubs@mit.edu (to request documents) online type help for On-Line Help (OLH) browser
If you are just getting started on Athena, make sure to read the following free documents first:
Getting Started on Athena Tutorial Working on Athena Managing Your Athena Account
If you already know something about Athena, you are probably ready to read about other Athena topics, such as electronic mail, document preparation, data analysis, and spreadsheets.
Athena documentation is available in several forms:
Athena Consultants
office 11-115
phone x3-4435 ("Consulting Hotline")
online type olc to connect to On-Line Consultant (OLC)
Whether contacted online or in person, Athena Consultants can help you with questions or problems about supported Athena software. They can also answer more general questions about Athena, such as locations of facilities or whom to contact with administrative questions. (Consultants are not required to answer questions about unsupported software, course software, or problem sets for courses you are taking. For course-specific questions, please contact your course Teaching Assistant.)
There are several ways to contact the Athena Consultants:
Athena Hardware Hotline phone x3-1410 email hotline@mit.edu hours M-Th 8am-11:30pm, F 8am-5pm, Sun 3pm-11:30pm (at other times, leave a message)
You should contact the Athena Hardware Hotline if you want to report:
If you call outside of live service hours, leave a message on the answering machine. Staff members monitor the recorded calls fairly frequently in the evenings and on the weekends. (Of course, response will not be as rapid as during weekdays.)
If you have a question about connecting to the campus network (MITnet), contact your local network service representative rather than the Hardware Hotline:
Dorm: your Residential Computing Consultant (RCC) ILG: your network administrator Other: the Network Help Desk (x3-4101)
ACS Faculty Liaisons office E40-357/359/360 phone x3-0115 email f_l@mit.edu
The Faculty Liaisons can help you in a variety of ways. They can:
ACS also maintains several Electronic Classroom facilities for use by subjects. These classrooms contain Athena workstations and projector facilities, and can be used for teaching classes where students require hands-on computer activity during the class session or recitation. ACS also maintains a cluster containing 15 Apple Macintosh computers which can be reserved for use by a small class or recitation section. (To schedule these classrooms, send email to eclass@mit.edu or call x3-1346).
The Faculty Liaisons are happy to meet with faculty to help them get up to speed on Athena, and help them plan effective and efficient ways to deliver subject material to students.
Student Information Processing Board (SIPB) office W20-557 phone x3-7788 email sipb@mit.edu
SIPB members will often answer questions about Athena software. They also answer questions about their own software, and may be able to help with questions about other popular unsupported software. They particularly like to help with esoteric and unusual problems.
The SIPB produces some documents about Athena, such as An Inessential Guide to Athena and Inessential LaTeX, and a number of one page documents on SIPB-supported software. You can pick these up in the SIPB office, or look at them online via the Athena On-Line Help system.
SIPB members also maintain an extensive collection of World Wide Web pages, which include the SIPB home pages plus hyperlinks to vast repositories of information about Athena, MIT, and the Internet beyond. (You can access the World Wide Web via clients such as Mosaic, Lynx, or Cello).
The SIPB office is located on the 5th floor of the Student Center, right next to Athena's largest public cluster. The office is open whenever a SIPB member is there, which means that, true to their hacker heritage, the office is often staffed at odd hours, including the middle of the night!